Norwich City's joint majority shareholder Delia Smith has fiercely criticised the financial structure of English football as "radically wrong" and called for a major overhaul.

"It's shocking that we pay our national manager an enormous amount of money and a football club like Chester ceases to exist," Smith told the BBC. "There is something radically wrong with football in this country and it needs major thought."

The disparity between English clubs has never been greater in terms of finances, with the Premier League's Manchester City expected to push their summer spending beyond the £100m mark before the end of the transfer window, just months after Chester were expelled from the Football Conference and then wound up having failed to settle their debts with Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs.

Asked what she thought about the money in the game, Smith said: "It's terrible – let's say to the world 'why don't we do something about football in this country to get it back on track?' I would go back to before we had the Premier League, when it was the best team wins.

"Now it is Premier League, it is money and it goes back out to Europe when we spend money on foreign players and this country is left struggling. Little football clubs are going out of business and it's wrong because the social side of it is very important. For young people football is a safe drug. I watch young people going to football and they let off steam in a safe way."